AMD CEO Admits To "Technical Glitch" With Barcelona Delays

[safan80]

http://www.firingsquad.com/news/news...searchid=17031
ha ha

SV link added to the quote by me.

AMD has been struggling of late to catch up with Intel and their plans for a true quad-core server processor, code named Barcelona, will finally be realized when it is scheduled to launch on Sept. 10. However a new Q&A at SiliconValley.com with AMD CEO Hector Ruiz reveals some interesting behind-the-scenes issues with the Barcelona chip:

It's awfully complicated. We're doing something that nobody has ever done. As strong as our competitor is, they have not done a quad core on a chip (four chip cores, or brains, laid out on a single piece of silicon instead of on two pieces attached together). . . . Every time we ran into a gotcha (or technical glitch), it created a six-week or so hole in the schedule as we went back and fixed it. We hoped we wouldn't get many of those, but in the Barcelona case, we got more than we thought. By the time we got through fixing them all, we were six months-plus late from where we originally wanted to be.

A desktop version of their quad-core chip, code named Phenom, is due to launch before the end of 2007.

[Vapor]

Finally some honesty from AMD....

[Jamesrt2004]

Probs' leakage is the main one I Reckon
but explains they "weren't late cos' there just lazy"

there was actually something wrong

[[XC] riptide]

Well hats off. At least they had the balls and conviction to keep going. I suppose they had no choice, but fair balls anyways.

[FghtinIrshNvrDi]

I want one... In a 2.8ghz flavor.

Ryan

[alfaunits]

I think all knew this long ago...
Let's hope they have some desktop market to sell to after Intel price cuts

[`danny]

At least they are honest

[SnipingWaste]

Im thinking the glitches were in the area of the IMC working with 4 cores and 4 cores working with the sheared L3 cache.

[Movieman]

Like vapor and riptide said, I like that. Crap happens.
People just want to hear the truth.
2 points to him for saying it no matter what the reasons were.

[lapdog]

At least they are honest

about time.
edit..or well past the time.

[cky2k6]

problem is that he is stating this now... though he probably did tell his investors this a while before. amd had a double whammy with barcelona. their 65nm process was late so they couldn't tape out the chip before it got online, and now they had these glitches. hopefully their next release goes much smoother, who knows how much more of these fiascos they can afford...

[Donnie27]

Like vapor and riptide said, I like that. Crap happens.
People just want to hear the truth.
2 points to him for saying it no matter what the reasons were.

You got that right!

No one really cares about that whole Native BS vs. non Native BS but a few Fanboys.

[EvlUndrWareNome]

amd got some more points in my book.

a sign of humility from a big company means alot to me.

[Shadowmage]

Did you know that the L3 cache did not work at all for the A0 revision?

[RPGWiZaRD]

Usually I don't wanna hear news like that but this time it only felt good. Totally agree with the other people in this thread.

Too bad it's not often you see honesty these days in this business. It's all about cowering the flaws and praising what's worth advertising. I would only feel better knowing there's flaws than having to speculate about it. After all not everything can be perfect.

[Decami]

Good job AMD, on Finally voicing out.

[Metroid]

Well nice to hear this, after all the insanities.

[nn_step]

You that right!

No one really cares about that whole Native BS vs. non Native BS but a few Fanboys.

and the Boys in the Fab but that is a different matter.

[gillll]

finally ......................i'm holding hands for amd

Like vapor and riptide said, I like that. Crap happens.
People just want to hear the truth.
2 points to him for saying it no matter what the reasons were.

one more vote here - crap happens just tell that it did and it's better then covering it.

[JumpingJack]

At least they are honest

Really??

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/0,1...9286118,00.htm
Henri Richard

"Barcelona is more of a killer product than Opteron when it was launched," said Henri Richard, executive vice president in charge of sales and marketing at AMD.

http://origin.siliconvalley.com/ci_6663261
Hector Ruiz

AI expect us to regain position in the server market because Barcelona is a very strong product. It won't have the huge impact Opteron had.

Both cannot be true.... someone is lying.

[JumpingJack]

problem is that he is stating this now... though he probably did tell his investors this a while before. amd had a double whammy with barcelona. their 65nm process was late so they couldn't tape out the chip before it got online, and now they had these glitches. hopefully their next release goes much smoother, who knows how much more of these fiascos they can afford...

They must have taped out the chip before 65 nm launched, because they demoed a second spin on Dec 5th (or was it 14th) 2006.

Nonetheless, the amount of rework to the K8 core they have put into this product is 'monsterous' to say the least, to not plan for problems was unwise.

[xlink]

You that right!

No one really cares about that whole Native BS vs. non Native BS but a few Fanboys.

I care.

because if they can get 4 cores native to a die then they can MCM those dice for 8 cores of fun...

[accord99]

I care.

because if they can get 4 cores native to a die then they can MCM those dice for 8 cores of fun...

But they can't, since the Barcelona core is too big to fit two of them on Socket F. And even two Shanghais won't fit, especially if it gets the enlarged L3 cache.

[naokaji]

i have to agree with the others that its good that they said the truth...
but....
we allready knew that for a long time.... because amd could not have another reason than that to not release barcelona earlier...

[hecktic]

the press release is actually good in a way IMO because when you carefully read it he is talking about the idea of the actual processor as being a true-quad-core chip whereas the competitor basically fused two dual core chips together.

I See that as a slap in the face to Intel lol and a reminder to people of what will be expected come time of the true launch of this highly exceptional chip AMD claims as true quad core.

Again just my opinion... yours will differ